The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola, by Victor Mindeleff and Cosmos Mindeleff

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Cibola, by Victor Mindeleff and Cosmos Mindeleff
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Title: A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola
Eighth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the
Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1886-1887,
Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 3-228

Author: Victor Mindeleff and Cosmos Mindeleff
Illustrator: Henry Hobart Nichols
Release Date: November 17, 2006 [EBook #19856]
Language: English
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* * * * *
A STUDY
of
PUEBLO ARCHITECTURE:
Tusayan And Cibola.
by
Victor Mindeleff.
* * * * *
CONTENTS.
Introduction 13
CHAPTER I.–Traditionary history of Tusayan 16
Explanatory 16
Summary of traditions 16
List of traditionary gentes 38
Supplementary legend 40
CHAPTER II.–Ruins and inhabited villages of Tusayan 42
Physical features of the province 42
Methods of survey 44
Plans and description of ruins 45
Walpi ruins 46
Old Mashongnavi 47
Shitaimuvi 48
Awatubi 49
Horn House 50
Small ruin near Horn House 51
Bat House 52
Mishiptonga 52
Moen-kopi 53
Ruins on the Oraibi wash 54
Kwaituki 56
Tebugkihu, or Fire House 57
Chukubi 59
Payupki 59
Plans and descriptions of inhabited villages 61
Hano 61
Sichumovi 62
Walpi 63
Mashongnavi 66
Shupaulovi 71
Shumopavi 73
Oraibi 76
Moen-kopi 77
CHAPTER III.–Ruins and inhabited villages of Cibola 80
Physical features of the province 80
Plans and descriptions of ruins 80
Hawikuh 80
Ketchipauan 81
Chalowe 83
Hampassawan 84
K’iakima 85
Matsaki 86
Pinawa 86
Halona 88
Tâaaiyalana ruins 89
Kin-tiel and Kinna-Zinde 91
Plans and descriptions of inhabited villages 94
Nutria 94
Pescado 95
Ojo Caliente 96
Zuñi 97
CHAPTER IV.–Architecture of Tusayan and Cibola compared
by constructional details 100
Introduction 100
Housebuilding 100
Rites and methods 100
Localization of gentes 104
Interior arrangement 108
Kivas in Tusayan 111
General use of kivas by pueblo builders 111
Origin of the name 111
Antiquity of the kiva 111
Excavation of the kiva 112
Access 113
Masonry 114
Orientation 115
The ancient form of kiva 116
Native explanations of position 117
Methods of kiva building and rites 118
Typical plans 118
Work by women 129
Consecration 129
Various uses of kivas 130
Kiva ownership 133
Motives for building a kiva 134
Significance of structural plan 135
Typical measurements 136
List of Tusayan Kivas 136
Details of Tusayan and Cibola construction 137
Walls 137
Roofs and floors 148
Wall copings and roof drains 151
Ladders and steps 156
Cooking pits and ovens 162
Oven-shaped structures 167
Fireplaces and chimneys 167
Gateways and covered passages 180
Doors 182
Windows 194
Roof openings 201
Furniture 208
Corrals and gardens; eagle cages 214
“Kisi” construction 217
Architectural nomenclature 220
Concluding remarks 223
ILLUSTRATIONS.
Page.
Plate I. Map of the provinces of Tusayan and Cibola 12
II. Old Mashongnavi, plan 14
III. General view of Awatubi 16
IV. Awatubi (Talla-Hogan), plan 18
V. Standing walls of Awatubi 20
VI. Adobe fragment in Awatubi 22
VII. Horn House ruin, plan 24
VIII. Bat House 26
IX. Mishiptonga (Jeditoh) 28
X. A small ruin near Moen-kopi 30
XI. Masonry on the outer wall of the Fire-House,
detail 32
XII. Chukubi, plan 34
XIII. Payupki, plan 36
XIV. General view of Payupki 38
XV. Standing walls of Payupki 40
XVI. Plan of Hano 42
XVII. View of Hano 44
XVIII. Plan of Sichumovi 46
XIX. View of Sichumovi 48
XX. Plan of Walpi 50
XXI. View of Walpi 52
XXII. South passageway of Walpi 54
XXIII. Houses built over irregular sites, Walpi 56
XXIV. Dance rock and kiva, Walpi 58
XXV. Foot trail to Walpi 60
XXVI. Mashongnavi, plan 62
XXVII. Mashongnavi with Shupaulovi in distance 64
XXVIII. Back wall of a Mashongnavi house-row 66
XXIX. West side of a principal row in Mashongnavi 68
XXX. Plan of Shupaulovi 70
XXXI. View of Shupaulovi 72
XXXII. A covered passageway of Shupaulovi 74
XXXIII. The chief kiva of Shupaulovi 76
XXXIV. Plan of Shumopavi 78
XXXV. View of Shumopavi 80
XXXVI. Oraibi, plan In pocket.
XXXVII. Key to the Oraibi plan, also showing
localization of gentes 82
XXXVIII. A court of Oraibi 84
XXXIX. Masonry terraces of Oraibi 86
XL. Oraibi house row, showing court side 88
XLI. Back of Oraibi house row 90
XLII. The site of Moen-kopi 92
XLIII. Plan of Moen-kopi 94
XLIV. Moen-kopi 96
XLV. The Mormon mill at Moen-kopi 98
XLVI. Hawikuh, plan 100
XLVII. Hawikuh, view 102
XLVIII. Adobe church at Hawikuh 104
XLIX. Ketchipanan, plan 106
L. Ketchipauan 108
LI. Stone church at Ketchipauan 110
LII. K’iakima, plan 112
LIII. Site of K’iakima, at base of Tâaaiyalana 114
LIV. Recent wall at K’iakima 116
LV. Matsaki, plan 118
LVI. Standing wall at Pinawa 120
LVII. Halona excavations as seen from Zuñi 122
LVIII. Fragments of Halona wall 124
LIX. The mesa of Tâaaiyalana, from Zuñi 126
LX. Tâaaiyalana, plan 128
LXI. Standing walls of Tâaaiyalana ruins 130
LXII. Remains of a reservoir on Tâaaiyalana 132
LXIII. Kin-tiel, plan (also showing excavations) 134
LXIV. North wall of Kin-tiel 136
LXV. Standing walls of Kin-tiel 138
LXVI. Kinna-Zinde 140
LXVII. Nutria, plan 142
LXVIII. Nutria, view 144
LXIX. Pescado, plan 146
LXX. Court view of Pescado, showing corrals 148
LXXI. Pescado houses 150
LXXII. Fragments of ancient masonry in Pescado 152
LXXIII. Ojo Caliente, plan In pocket.
LXXIV. General view of Ojo Caliente 154
LXXV. House at Ojo Caliente 156
LXXVI. Zuñi, plan In pocket.
LXXVII. Outline plan of Zuñi, showing distribution
of oblique openings 158
LXXVIII. General inside view of Zuñi, looking west 160
LXXIX. Zuñi terraces 162
LXXX. Old adobe church of Zuñi 164
LXXXI. Eastern rows of Zuñi 166
LXXXII. A Zuñi court 168
LXXXIII. A Zuñi small house 170
LXXXIV. A house-building at Oraibi 172
LXXXV. A Tusayan interior 174
LXXXVI. A Zuñi interior 176
LXXXVII. A kiva hatchway of Tusayan 178
LXXXVIII. North kivas of Shumopavi, from the northeast 180
LXXXIX. Masonry in the north wing of Kin-tiel 182
XC. Adobe garden walls near Zuñi. 184
XCI. A group of stone corrals near Oraibi 186
XCII. An inclosing wall of upright stones at
Ojo Caliente 188
XCIII. Upright blocks of sandstone built into an
ancient pueblo wall 190
XCIV. Ancient wall of upright rocks in southwestern
Colorado 192
XCV. Ancient floor-beams at Kin-tiel 194
XCVI. Adobe walls in Zuñi 196
XCVII. Wall coping and oven at Zuñi 198
XCVIII. Cross-pieces on Zuñi ladders 200
XCIX. Outside steps at Pescado 202
C. An excavated room at Kin-tiel 204
CI. Masonry chimneys of Zuñi 206
CII. Remains of a gateway in Awatubi 208
CIII. Ancient gateway, Kin-tiel 210
CIV. A covered passageway in Mashongnavi 212
CV. Small square openings in Pueblo Bonito 214
CVI. Sealed openings in a detached house of Nutria 216
CVII. Partial filling-in of a large opening in
Oraibi, converting it into a doorway 218
CVIII. Large openings reduced to small windows, Oraibi 220
CIX. Stone corrals and kiva of Mashongnavi 222
CX. Portion of a corral in Pescado 224
CXI. Zuñi eagle-cage 226
Page.
Fig. 1. View of the First Mesa 43
2. Ruins, Old Walpi mound 47
3. Ruin between Bat House and Horn House 51
4. Ruin near Moen-kopi, plan 53
5. Ruin 7 miles north of Oraibi 55
6. Ruin 14 miles north of Oraibi (Kwaituki) 56
7. Oval fire-house ruin, plan. (Tebugkihu) 58
8. Topography of the site of Walpi 64
9. Mashongnavi and Shupaulovi from Shumopavi 66
10. Diagram showing growth of Mashongnavi 67
11. Diagram showing growth of Mashongnavi 68
12. Diagram showing growth of Mashongnavi 69
13. Topography of the site of Shupaulovi 71
14. Court kiva of Shumopavi 75
15. Hampassawan, plan 84
16. Pinawa, plan 87
17. Nutria, plan; small diagram, old wall 94
18. Pescado, plan, old wall diagram 95
19. A Tusayan wood-rack 103
20. Interior ground plan of a Tusayan room 108
21. North kivas of Shumopavi from the southwest 114
22. Ground plan of the chief-kiva of Shupaulovi 122
23. Ceiling-plan of the chief-kiva of Shupaulovi 123
24. Interior view of a Tusayan kiva 124
25. Ground-plan of a Shupaulovi kiva 125
26. Ceiling-plan of a Shupaulovi kiva 125
27. Ground-plan of the chief-kiva of Mashongnavi 126
28. Interior view of a kiva hatchway in Tusayan 127
29. Mat used in closing the entrance of Tusayan kivas 128
30. Rectangular sipapuh in a Mashongnavi kiva 131
31. Loom-post in kiva floor at Tusayan 132
32. A Zuñi chimney showing pottery fragments embedded in
its adobe base 139
33. A Zuñi oven with pottery scales embedded in
its surface 139
34. Stone wedges of Zuñi masonry exposed in a
rain-washed wall 141
35. An unplastered house wall in Ojo Caliente 142
36. Wall decorations in Mashongnavi, executed in pink
on a white ground 146
37. Diagram of Zuñi roof construction 149
38. Showing abutment of smaller roof-beams over
round girders 151
39. Single stone roof-drains 153
40. Trough roof-drains of stone 153
41. Wooden roof-drains 154
42. Curved roof-drains of stone in Tusayan 154
43. Tusayan roof-drains; a discarded metate and a gourd 155
44. Zuñi roof-drain, with splash-stones on roof below 156
45. A modern notched ladder in Oraibi 157
46. Tusayan notched ladders from Mashongnavi 157
47. Aboriginal American forms of ladder 158
48. Stone steps at Oraibi with platform at corner 161
49. Stone steps, with platform at chimney, in Oraibi 161
50. Stone steps in Shumopavi 162
51. A series of cooking pits in Mashongnavi 163
52. Pi-gummi ovens of Mashongnavi 163
53. Cross sections of pi-gummi ovens of Mashongnavi 163
54. Diagrams showing foundation stones of a Zuñi oven 164
55. Dome-shaped oven on a plinth of masonry 165
56. Oven in Pescado exposing stones of masonry 166
57. Oven in Pescado exposing stones of masonry 166
58. Shrines in Mashongnavi 167
59. A poultry house in Sichumovi resembling an oven 167
60. Ground-plan of an excavated room in Kin-tiel 168
61. A corner chimney-hood with two supporting poles,
Tusayan 170
62. A curved chimney-hood of Mashongnavi 170
63. A Mashongnavi chimney-hood and walled-up fireplace 171
64. A chimney-hood of Shupaulovi 172
65. A semi-detached square chimney-hood of Zuñi 172
66. Unplastered Zuñi chimney-hoods,
illustrating construction 173
67. A fireplace and mantel in Sichumovi 174
68. A second-story fireplace in Mashongnavi 174
69. Piki stone and chimney-hood in Sichumovi 175
70. Piki stone and primitive andiron in Shumopavi 176
71. A terrace fireplace and chimney of Shumopavi 177
72. A terrace cooking-pit and chimney of Walpi 177
73. A ground cooking-pit of Shumopavi covered with
a chimney 178
74. Tusayan chimneys 179
75. A barred Zuñi door 183
76. Wooden pivot hinges of a Zuñi door 184
77. Paneled wooden doors in Hano 185
78. Framing of a Zuñi door panel 186
79. Rude transoms over Tusayan openings 188
80. A large Tusayan doorway, with small transom openings 189
81. A doorway and double transom in Walpi 189
82. An ancient doorway in a Canyon de Chelly cliff ruin 190
83. A symmetrical notched doorway in Mashongnavi 190
84. A Tusayan notched doorway 191
85. A large Tusayan doorway with one notched jamb 192
86. An ancient circular doorway, or “stone-close,”
in Kin-tiel 193
87. Diagram illustrating symmetrical arrangement of
small openings in Pueblo Bonito 195
88. Incised decoration on a rude window-sash in Zuñi 196
89. Sloping selenite window at base of Zuñi wall
on upper terrace 197
90. A Zuñi window glazed with selenite 197
91. Small openings in the back wall of a Zuñi
house cluster 198
92. Sealed openings in Tusayan 199
93. A Zuñi doorway converted into a window 201
94. Zuñi roof-openings 202
95. A Zuñi roof-opening with raised coping 203
96. Zuñi roof-openings with one raised end 203
97. A Zuñi roof-hole with cover 204
98. Kiva trap-door in Zuñi 205
99. Halved and pinned trap-door frame of a Zuñi kiva 206
100. Typical sections of Zuñi oblique openings 208
101. Arrangement of mealing stones in a Tusayan house 209
102. A Tusayan grain bin 210
103. A Zuñi plume-box 210
104. A Zuñi plume-box 210
105. A Tusayan mealing trough 211
106. An ancient pueblo form of metate 211
107. Zuñi stools 213
108. A Zuñi chair 213
109. Construction of a Zuñi corral 215
110. Gardens of Zuñi 216
111. “Kishoni,” or uncovered shade, of Tusayan 218
112. A Tusayan field shelter, from southwest 219
113. A Tusayan field shelter, from northeast 219
114. Diagram showing ideal section of terraces,
with Tusayan names 223
[Illustration: Plate I.
General Map of the Pueblo Region of Arizona and New Mexico,
Showing Relative Position of the Provinces of Tusayan and Cibola.
by Victor Mindeleff.]
* * * * *
A STUDY OF PUEBLO ARCHITECTURE
IN TUSAYAN AND CIBOLA.
By Victor Mindeleff.
* * * * *
INTRODUCTION.
The remains of pueblo architecture are found scattered over thousands
of square miles of the arid region of the southwestern plateaus. This
vast area includes the drainage of the Rio Pecos on the east and that
of the Colorado on the west, and extends from central Utah on the north
beyond the limits of the United States southward, in which direction its
boundaries are still undefined.
The descendants of those who at various times built these stone
villages are few in number and inhabit about thirty pueblos distributed
irregularly over parts of the region formerly occupied. Of these the
greater number are scattered along the upper course of the Rio Grande
and its tributaries in New Mexico; a few of them, comprised within the
ancient provinces of Cibola and Tusayan, are located within the
drainage of the Little Colorado. From the time of the earliest Spanish
expeditions into the country to the present day, a period covering more
than three centuries, the former province has been often visited by
whites, but the remoteness of Tusayan and the arid and forbidding
character of its surroundings have caused its more complete isolation.
The architecture of this district exhibits a close adherence to
aboriginal practices, still bears the marked impress of its development
under the exacting conditions of an arid environment, and is but slowly
yielding to the influence of foreign ideas.
The present study of the architecture of Tusayan and Cibola embraces all
of the inhabited pueblos of those provinces, and includes a number of
the ruins traditionally connected with them. It will be observed by
reference to the map that the area embraced in these provinces comprises
but a small portion of the vast region over which pueblo culture once
extended.
This study is designed to be followed by a similar study of two typical
groups of ruins, viz, that of Canyon de Chelly, in northeastern Arizona,
and that of the Chaco Canyon, of New Mexico; but it has been necessary
for the writer to make occasional reference to these ruins in the
present paper, both in the discussion of general arrangement and
characteristic ground plans, embodied in Chapters II and III and in the
comparison by constructional details treated in Chapter IV, in order
to define clearly the relations of the various features of pueblo
architecture. They belong to the same pueblo system illustrated by the
villages of Tusayan and Cibola, and with the Canyon de Chelly group
there is even some trace of traditional connection, as is set forth by
Mr. Stephen in Chapter I. The more detailed studies of these ruins, to
be published later, together with the material embodied in the present
paper, will, it is thought, furnish a record of the principal
characteristics of an important type of primitive architecture, which,
under the influence of the arid environment of the southwestern
plateaus, has developed from the rude lodge into the many-storied
house of rectangular rooms. Indications of some of the steps of this
development are traceable even in the architecture of the present day.
The pueblo of Zuñi was surveyed by the writer in the autumn of 1881
with a view to procuring the necessary data for the construction of a
large-scale model of this pueblo. For this reason the work afforded a
record of external features only.
The modern pueblos of Tusayan were similarly surveyed in the following
season (1882-’83), the plans being supplemented by photographs, from
which many of the illustrations accompanying this paper have been drawn.
The ruin of Awatubi was also included in the work of this season.
In the autumn of 1885 many of the ruined pueblos of Tusayan were
surveyed and examined. It was during this season’s work that the details
of the kiva construction, embodied in the last chapter of this paper,
were studied, together with interior details of the dwellings. It was in
the latter part of this season that the farming pueblos of Cibola were
surveyed and photographed.
The Tusayan farming pueblo of Moen-kopi and a number of the ruins in the
province were surveyed and studied in the early part of the season of
1887-’88, the latter portion of which season was principally devoted to
an examination of the Chaco ruins in New Mexico.
In the prosecution of the field work above outlined the author has been
greatly indebted to the efficient assistance and hearty cooperation of
Mr. Cosmos Mindeleff, by whom nearly all the pueblos illustrated, with
the exception of Zuñi, have been surveyed and platted.
The plans obtained have involved much careful work with surveying
instruments, and have all been so platted as faithfully to record the
minute variations from geometric forms which are so characteristic of
the pueblo work, but which have usually been ignored in the hastily
prepared sketch plans that have at times appeared. In consequence of
the necessary omission of just such information in hastily drawn plans,
erroneous impressions have been given regarding the degree of skill to
which the pueblo peoples had attained in the planning and building of
their villages. In the general distribution of the houses, and in the
alignment and arrangement of their walls, as indicated in the plans
shown in Chapters II and III, an absence of high architectural
attainment is found, which is entirely in keeping with the lack of skill
apparent in many of the constructional devices shown in Chapter IV.
[Illustration: Plate II. Old Mashongnavi, plan.]
In preparing this paper for publication Mr. Cosmos Mindeleff has
rendered much assistance in the revision of manuscript, and in the
preparation of some of the final drawings of ground plans; on him has
also fallen the compilation and arrangement of Mr. A. M. Stephen’s
traditionary material from Tusayan, embraced in the first chapter of the
paper.
This latter material is of special interest in a study of the pueblos as
indicating some of the conditions under which this architectural type
was developed, and it appropriately introduces the more purely
architectural study by the author.
Such traditions must be used as history with the utmost caution,
and only for events that are very recent. Time relations are often
hopelessly confused and the narratives are greatly incumbered with
mythologic details. But while so barren in definite information, these
traditions are of the greatest value, often through their merely
incidental allusions, in presenting to our minds a picture of the
conditions under which the repeated migrations of the pueblo builders
took place.
The development of architecture among the Pueblo Indians was
comparatively rapid and is largely attributable to frequent changes,
migrations, and movements of the people as described in Mr. Stephen’s
account. These changes were due to a variety of causes, such as disease,
death, the frequent warfare carried on between different tribes and
branches of the builders, and the hostility of outside tribes; but a
most potent factor was certainly the inhospitable character of their
environment. The disappearance of some venerated spring during an
unusually dry season would be taken as a sign of the disfavor of the
gods, and, in spite of the massive character of the buildings, would
lead to the migration of the people to a more favorable spot. The
traditions of the Zuñis, as well as those of the Tusayan, frequently
refer to such migrations. At times tribes split up and separate, and
again phratries or distant groups meet and band together. It is
remarkable that the substantial character of the architecture should
persist through such long series of compulsory removals, but while the
builders were held together by the necessity for defense against their
wilder neighbors or against each other, this strong defensive motive
would perpetuate the laborious type of construction. Such conditions
would contribute to the rapid development of the building art.
CHAPTER I.
TRADITIONAL HISTORY OF TUSAYAN.
EXPLANATORY.
In this chapter[1] is presented a summary of the traditions of the
Tusayan, a number of which were collected from old men, from Walpi on
the east to Moen-kopi on the west. A tradition varies much with the
tribe and the individual; an authoritative statement of the current
tradition on any point could be made only with a complete knowledge of
all traditions extant. Such knowledge is not possessed by any one man,
and the material included in this chapter is presented simply as a
summary of the traditions secured.
[Footnote 1: This chapter is compiled by Cosmos Mindeleff from
material collected by A. M. Stephen.]
The material was collected by Mr. A. M. Stephen, of Keam’s Canyon,
Arizona, who has enjoyed unusual facilities for the work, having lived
for a number of years past in Tusayan and possessed the confidence
of the principal priests–a very necessary condition in work of
this character. Though far from complete, this summary is a more
comprehensive presentation of the traditionary history of these people
than has heretofore been published.
SUMMARY OF TRADITIONS.
The creation myths of the Tusayan differ widely, but none of them
designate the region now occupied as the place of their genesis. These
people are socially divided into family groups called wi´ngwu, the
descendants of sisters, and groups of wi´ngwu tracing descent from the
same female ancestor, and having a common totem called my´umu. Each of
these totemic groups preserves a creation myth, carrying in its details
special reference to themselves; but all of them claim a common origin
in the interior of the earth, although the place of emergence to the
surface is set in widely separated localities. They all agree in
maintaining this to be the fourth plane on which mankind has existed. In
the beginning all men lived together in the lowest depths, in a region
of darkness and moisture; their bodies were misshaped and horrible, and
they suffered great misery, moaning and bewailing continually. Through
the intervention of Myúingwa (a vague conception known as the god of the
interior) and of Baholikonga (a crested serpent of enormous size, the
genius of water), the “old men” obtained a seed from which sprang a
magic growth of cane. It penetrated through a crevice in the roof
overhead and mankind climbed to a higher plane. A dim light appeared in
this stage and vegetation was produced. Another magic growth of cane
afforded the means of rising to a still higher plane on which the light
was brighter; vegetation was reproduced and the animal kingdom was
created. The final ascent to this present, or fourth plane, was effected
by similar magic growths and was led by mythic twins, according to some
of the myths, by climbing a great pine tree, in others by climbing the
cane, _Phragmites communis_, the alternate leaves of which afforded
steps as of a ladder, and in still others it is said to have been a
rush, through the interior of which the people passed up to the surface.
The twins sang as they pulled the people out, and when their song was
ended no more were allowed to come; and hence, many more were left below
than were permitted to come above; but the outlet through which mankind
came has never been closed, and Myu´ingwa sends through it the germs of
all living things. It is still symbolized by the peculiar construction
of the hatchway of the kiva and in the designs on the sand altars in
these underground chambers, by the unconnected circle painted on pottery
and by devices on basketry and other textile fabrics.
[Illustration: Plate III. General view of Awatubi.]
All the people that were permitted to come to the surface were collected
and the different families of men were arranged together. This was done
under the direction of twins, who are called Pekónghoya, the younger one
being distinguished by the term Balíngahoya, the Echo. They were
assisted by their grandmother, Kóhkyang wúhti, the Spider woman, and
these appear in varying guises in many of the myths and legends. They
instructed the people in divers modes of life to dwell on mountain or on
plain, to build lodges, or huts, or windbreaks. They distributed
appropriate gifts among them and assigned each a pathway, and so the
various families of mankind were dispersed over the earth’s surface.
The Hopituh,[2] after being taught to build stone houses, were also
divided, and the different divisions took separate paths. The legends
indicate a long period of extensive migrations in separate communities;
the groups came to Tusayan at different times and from different
directions, but the people of all the villages concur in designating the
Snake people as the first occupants of the region. The eldest member of
that nyumu tells a curious legend of their migration from which the
following is quoted:
At the general dispersal my people lived in snake skins, each family
occupying a separate snake skin bag, and all were hung on the end of
a rainbow, which swung around until the end touched Navajo Mountain,
where the bags dropped from it; and wherever a bag dropped, there
was their house. After they arranged their bags they came out from
them as men and women, and they then, built a stone house which had
five sides. [The story here relates the adventures of a mythic Snake
Youth, who brought back a strange woman who gave birth to
rattlesnakes; these bit the people and compelled them to migrate.] A
brilliant star arose in the southeast, which would shine for a while
and then disappear. The old men said, “Beneath that star there must
be people,” so they determined to travel toward it. They cut a staff
and set it in the ground and watched till the star reached its top,
then they started and traveled as long as the star shone; when it
disappeared they halted. But the star did not shine every night, for
sometimes many years elapsed before it appeared again. When this
occurred, our people built houses during their halt; they built both
round and square houses, and all the ruins between here and Navajo
Mountain mark the places where our people lived. They waited till
the star came to the top of the staff again, then they moved on, but
many people were left in those houses and they followed afterward at
various times. When our people reached Wipho (a spring a few miles
north from Walpi) the star disappeared and has never been seen
since. They built a house there and after a time Másauwu (the god of
the face of the earth) came and compelled them to move farther down
the valley, to a point about half way between the East and Middle
Mesa, and there they stayed many plantings. One time the old men
were assembled and Másauwu came among them, looking like a horrible
skeleton, and his bones rattling dreadfully. He menaced them with
awful gestures, and lifted off his fleshless head and thrust it into
their faces; but he could not frighten them. So he said, “I have
lost my wager; all that I have is yours; ask for anything you want
and I will give it to you.” At that time our people’s house was
beside the water course, and Másauwu said, “Why are you sitting here
in the mud? Go up yonder where it is dry.” So they went across to
the low, sandy terrace on the west side of the mesa, near the point,
and built a house and lived there. Again the old men were assembled
and two demons came among them and the old men took the great Baho
and the nwelas and chased them away. When they were returning, and
were not far north from, their village, they met the Lenbaki
(Cane-Flute, a religious society still maintained) of the Horn
family. The old men would not allow them to come in until Másauwu
appeared and declared them to be good Hopituh. So they built houses
adjoining ours and that made a fine, large village. Then other
Hopituh came in from time to time, and our people would say, “Build
here, or build there,” and portioned the land among the new comers.
[Footnote 2: The term by which the Tusayan Indians proper designate
themselves. This term does not include the inhabitants of the
village of Tewa or Hano, who are called Hanomuh.]
The site of the first Snake house in the valley, mentioned in the
foregoing legend, is now barely to be discerned, and the people refuse
to point out the exact spot. It is held as a place of votive offerings
during the ceremony of the Snake dance, and, as its name, Bátni,
implies, certain rain-fetiches are deposited there in small jars buried
in the ground. The site of the village next occupied can be quite easily
distinguished, and is now called Kwetcap tutwi, ash heap terrace, and
this was the village to which the name Walpi was first applied–a term
meaning the place at the notched mesa, in allusion to a broad gap in the
stratum of sandstone on the summit of the mesa, and by which it can be
distinguished from a great distance. The ground plan of this early Walpi
can still be partly traced, indicating the former existence of an
extensive village of clustering, little-roomed houses, with thick walls
constructed of small stones.
The advent of the Lenbaki is still commemorated by a biennial ceremony,
and is celebrated on the year alternating with their other biennial
ceremony, the Snake dance.
The Horn people, to which the Lenbaki belonged, have a legend of coming
from a mountain range in the east.
Its peaks were always snow covered, and the trees were always green.
From the hillside the plains were seen, over which roamed the deer,
the antelope, and the bison, feeding on never-failing grasses.
Twining through these plains were streams of bright water, beautiful
to look upon. A place where none but those who were of our people
ever gained access.
[Illustration: Plate IV. Awatubi (Talla-Hogan), plan.]
This description suggests some region of the head-waters of the Rio
Grande. Like the Snake people, they tell of a protracted migration, not
of continuous travel, for they remained for many seasons in one place,
where they would plant and build permanent houses. One of these halting
places is described as a canyon with high, steep walls, in which was a
flowing stream; this, it is said, was the Tségi (the Navajo name for
Canyon de Chelly). Here they built a large house in a cavernous recess,
high up in the canyon wall. They tell of devoting two years[3] to ladder
making and cutting and pecking shallow holes up the steep rocky side by
which to mount to the cavern, and three years more were employed in
building the house. While this work was in progress part of the men were
planting gardens, and the women and children were gathering stones. But
no adequate reason is given for thus toiling to fit this impracticable
site for occupation; the footprints of Másauwu, which they were
following, led them there.
[Footnote 3: The term yasuna, translated here as "year," is of
rather indefinite significance; it sometimes means thirteen moons
and in other instances much longer periods.]
The legend goes on to tell that after they had lived there for a long
time a stranger happened to stray in their vicinity, who proved to be a
Hopituh, and said that he lived in the south. After some stay he left
and was accompanied by a party of the “Horn,” who were to visit the land
occupied by their kindred Hopituh and return with an account of them;
but they never came back. After waiting a long time another band was
sent, who returned and said that the first emissaries had found wives
and had built houses on the brink of a beautiful canyon, not far from
the other Hopituh dwellings. After this many of the Horns grew
dissatisfied with their cavern home, dissensions arose, they left their
home, and finally they reached Tusayan. They lived at first in one of
the canyons east of the villages, in the vicinity of Keam’s Canyon, and
some of the numerous ruins on its brink mark the sites of their early
houses. There seems to be no legend distinctly attaching any particular
ruin to the Horn people, although there is little doubt that the Snake
and the Horn were the two first peoples who came to the neighborhood of
the present villages. The Bear people were the next, but they arrived as
separate branches, and from opposite directions, although of the same
Hopituh stock. It has been impossible to obtain directly the legend of
the Bears from the west. The story of the Bears from the east tells of
encountering the Fire people, then living about 25 miles east from
Walpi; but these are now extinct, and nearly all that is known of them
is told in the Bear legend, the gist of which is as follows:
The Bears originally lived among the mountains of the east, not far
distant from the Horns. Continual quarrels with neighboring villages
brought on actual fighting, and the Bears left that region and traveled
westward. As with all the other people, they halted, built houses, and
planted, remaining stationary for a long while; this occurred at
different places along their route.
A portion of these people had wings, and they flew in advance to survey
the land, and when the main body were traversing an arid region they
found water for them. Another portion had claws with which they dug
edible roots, and they could also use them for scratching hand and foot
holes in the face of a steep cliff. Others had hoofs, and these carried
the heaviest burdens; and some had balls of magic spider web, which they
could use on occasion for ropes, and they could also spread the web and
use it as a mantle, rendering the wearer invisible when he apprehended
danger.
They too came to the Tségi (Canyon de Chelly), where they found houses
but no people, and they also built houses there. While living there a
rupture occurred, a portion of them separating and going far to the
westward. These seceding bands are probably that branch of the Bears who
claim their origin in the west. Some time after this, but how long after
is not known, a plague visited the canyon, and the greater portion of
the people moved away, but leaving numbers who chose to remain. They
crossed the Chinli valley and halted for a short time at a place a short
distance northeast from Great Willow water (“Eighteen Mile Spring”).
They did not remain there long, however, but moved a few miles farther
west, to a place occupied by the Fire people who lived in a large oval
house. The ruin of this house still stands, the walls from 5 to 8 feet
high, and remarkable from the large-sized blocks of stone used in their
construction; it is still known to the Hopituh as Tebvwúki, the
Fire-house. Here some fighting occurred, and the Bears moved westward
again to the head of Antelope (Jeditoh) Canyon, about 4 miles from
Keam’s Canyon and about 15 miles east from Walpi. They built there a
rambling cluster of small-roomed houses, of which the ground plan has
now become almost obliterated. This ruin is called by the Hopituh “the
ruin at the place of wild gourds.” They seem to have occupied this
neighborhood for a considerable period, as mention is made of two or
three segregations, when groups of families moved a few miles away and
built similar house clusters on the brink of that canyon.
[Illustration: Plate V. Standing walls of Awatubi.]
The Fire-people, who, some say, were of the Horn people, must have
abandoned their dwelling at the Oval House or must have been driven out
at the time of their conflict with the Bears, and seem to have traveled
directly to the neighborhood of Walpi. The Snakes allotted them a place
to build in the valley on the east side of the mesa, and about two miles
north from the gap. A ridge of rocky knolls and sand dunes lies at the
foot of the mesa here, and close to the main cliff is a spring. There
are two prominent knolls about 400 yards apart and the summits of these
are covered with traces of house walls; also portions of walls can be
discerned on all the intervening hummocks. The place is known as
Sikyátki, the yellow-house, from the color of the sandstone of which the
houses were built. These and other fragmentary bits have walls not over
a foot thick, built of small stones dressed by rubbing, and all laid in
mud; the inside of the walls also show a smooth coating of mud plaster.
The dimensions of the rooms are very small, the largest measuring 9½
feet long, by 4½ feet wide. It is improbable that any of these
structures were over two stories high, and many of them were built in
excavated places around the rocky summits of the knolls. In these
instances no rear wall was built; the partition walls, radiating at
irregular angles, abut against the rock itself. Still, the great numbers
of these houses, small as they were, must have been far more than the
Fire-people could have required, for the oval house which they abandoned
measures not more than a hundred feet by fifty. Probably other incoming
gentes, of whom no story has been preserved, had also the ill fate to
build there, for the Walpi people afterward slew all its inhabitants.
There is little or no detail in the legends of the Bear people as to
their life in Antelope Canyon; they can now distinguish only one ruin
with certainty as having been occupied by their ancestors, while to all
the other ruins fanciful names have been applied. Nor is there any
special cause mentioned for abandoning their dwellings there; probably,
however, a sufficient reason was the cessation of springs in their
vicinity. Traces of former large springs are seen at all of them, but no
water flows from them at the present time. Whatever their motive, the
Bears left Antelope Canyon, and moved over to the village of Walpi,
on the terrace below the point of the mesa. They were received kindly
there, and were apparently placed on an equal footing with the Walpi,
for it seems the Snake, Horn, and Bear have always been on terms of
friendship. They built houses at that village, and lived there for some
considerable time; then they moved a short distance and built again
almost on the very point of the mesa. This change was not caused by any
disagreement with their neighbors; they simply chose that point as a
suitable place on which to build all their houses together. The site of
this Bear house is called Kisákobi, the obliterated house, and the name
is very appropriate, as there is merely the faintest trace here and
there to show where a building stood, the stones having been used in the
construction of the modern Walpi. These two villages were quite close
together, and the subsequent construction of a few additional groups of
rooms almost connected them, so that they were always considered and
spoken of as one.
It was at this period, while Walpi was still on this lower site, that
the Spaniards came into the country. They met with little or no
opposition, and their entrance was marked by no great disturbances.
No special tradition preserves any of the circumstances of this event;
these first coming Spaniards being only spoken of as the “Kast´ilumuh
who wore iron garments, and came from the south,” and this brief mention
may be accounted for by the fleeting nature of these early visits.
The zeal of the Spanish priests carried them everywhere throughout their
newly acquired territory, and some time in the seventeenth century a
band of missionary monks found their way to Tusayan. They were
accompanied by a few troops to impress the people with a due regard for
Spanish authority, but to display the milder side of their mission, they
also brought herds of sheep and cattle for distribution. At first these
were herded at various springs within a wide radius around the villages,
and the names still attaching to these places memorize the introduction
of sheep and cattle to this region. The Navajo are first definitely
mentioned in tradition as occupants of this vicinity in connection with
these flocks and herds, in the distribution of which they gave much
undesirable assistance by driving off the larger portion to their own
haunts.
The missionaries selected Awatubi, Walpi, and Shumopavi as the sites for
their mission buildings, and at once, it is said, began to introduce a
system of enforced labor. The memory of the mission period is held in
great detestation, and the onerous toil the priests imposed is still
adverted to as the principal grievance. Heavy pine timbers, many of
which are now pointed out in the kiva roofs, of from 15 to 20 feet in
length and a foot or more in diameter, were cut at the San Francisco
Mountain, and gangs of men were compelled to carry and drag them to the
building sites, where they were used as house beams. This necessitated
prodigious toil, for the distance by trail is a hundred miles, most of
the way over a rough and difficult country. The Spaniards are said to
have employed a few ox teams in this labor, but the heaviest share was
performed by the impressed Hopituh, who were driven in gangs by the
Spanish soldiers, and any who refused to work were confined in a prison
house and starved into submission.
The “men with the long robes,” as the missionaries were called, are said
to have lived among these people for a long time, but no trace of their
individuality survives in tradition.
Possibly the Spanish missionaries may have striven to effect some social
improvement among these people, and by the adoption of some harsh
measures incurred the jealous anger of the chiefs. But the system of
labor they enforced was regarded, perhaps justly, as the introduction of
serfdom, such as then prevailed in the larger communities in the Rio
Grande valleys. Perhaps tradition belies them; but there are many
stories of their evil, sensual lives–assertions that they violated
women, and held many of the young girls at their mission houses, not as
pupils, but as concubines.
[Illustration: Plate VI. Adobe fragment in Awatubi.]
In any case, these hapless monks were engaged in a perilous mission in
seeking to supplant the primitive faith of the Tusayan, for among the
native priests they encountered prejudices even as violent as their own.
With too great zeal they prohibited the sacred dances, the votive
offerings to the nature-deities, and similar public observances, and
strove to suppress the secret rites and abolish the religious orders and
societies. But these were too closely incorporated with the system of
gentes and other family kinships to admit of their extinction.
Traditionally, it is said that, following the discontinuance of the
prescribed ceremonies, the favor of the gods was withdrawn, the clouds
brought no rain, and the fields yielded no corn. Such a coincidence in
this arid region is by no means improbable, and according to the
legends, a succession of dry seasons resulting in famine has been of not
infrequent occurrence. The superstitious fears of the people were thus
aroused, and they cherished a mortal hatred of the monks.
In such mood were they in the summer of 1680, when the village Indians
rose in revolt, drove out the Spaniards, and compelled them to retreat
to Mexico. There are some dim traditions of that event still existing
among the Tusayan, and they tell of one of their own race coming from
the river region by the way of Zuñi to obtain their cooperation in the
proposed revolt. To this they consented.
Only a few Spaniards being present at that time, the Tusayan found
courage to vent their enmity in massacre, and every one of the hated
invaders perished on the appointed day. The traditions of the massacre
center on the doom of the monks, for they were regarded as the
embodiment of all that was evil in Spanish rule, and their pursuit,
as they tried to escape among the sand dunes, and the mode of their
slaughter, is told with grim precision; they were all overtaken and
hacked to pieces with stone tomahawks.
It is told that while the monks were still in authority some of the
Snake women urged a withdrawal from Walpi, and, to incite the men to
action, carried their mealing-stones and cooking vessels to the summit
of the mesa, where they desired the men to build new houses, less
accessible to the domineering priests. The men followed them, and two or
three small house groups were built near the southwest end of the
present village, one of them being still occupied by a Snake family, but
the others have been demolished or remodeled. A little farther north,
also on the west edge, the small house clusters there were next built by
the families of two women called Tji-vwó-wati and Si-kya-tcí-wati.
Shortly after the massacre the lower village was entirely abandoned, and
the building material carried above to the point which the Snakes had
chosen, and on which the modern Walpi was constructed. Several beams of
the old mission houses are now pointed out in the roofs of the kivas.
There was a general apprehension that the Spaniards would send a force
to punish them, and the Shumopavi also reconstructed their village in a
stronger position, on a high mesa overlooking its former site. The other
villages were already in secure positions, and all the smaller
agricultural settlements were abandoned at this period, and excepting at
one or two places on the Moen-kopi, the Tusayan have ever since confined
themselves to the close vicinity of their main villages.
The house masses do not appear to bear any relation to division by
phratries. It is surprising that even the social division of the
phratries is preserved. The Hopituh certainly marry within phratries,
and occasionally with the same gens. There is no doubt, however, that in
the earlier villages each gens, and where practicable, the whole of the
phratry, built their houses together. To a certain extent the house of
the priestess of a gens is still regarded as the home of the gens. She
has to be consulted concerning proposed marriages, and has much to say
in other social arrangements.
While the village of the Walpi was still upon the west side of the mesa
point, some of them moved around and built houses beside a spring close
to the east side of the mesa. Soon after this a dispute over planting
ground arose between them and the Sikyátki, whose village was also on
that side of the mesa and but a short distance above them. From this
time forward bad blood lay between the Sikyátki and the Walpi, who took
up the quarrel of their suburb. It also happened about that time, so
tradition says, more of the Coyote people came from the north, and the
Pikyás nyu-mu, the young cornstalk, who were the latest of the Water
people, came in from the south. The Sikyátki, having acquired their
friendship, induced them to build on two mounds, on the summit of the
mesa overlooking their village. They had been greatly harrassed by the
young slingers and archers of Walpi, who would come across to the edge
of the high cliff and assail them with impunity, but the occupation of
these two mounds by friends afforded effectual protection to their
village. These knolls are about 40 yards apart, and about 40 feet above
the level of the mesa which is something over 400 feet above Sikyátki.
Their roughly leveled summits measure 20 by 10 feet and are covered with
traces of house walls; and it is evident that groups of small-roomed
houses were clustered also around the sloping sides. About a hundred
yards south from their dwellings the people of the mounds built for
their own protection a strong wall entirely across the mesa, which at
that point is contracted to about 200 feet in width, with deep vertical
cliffs on either side. The base of the wall is still quite distinct, and
is about 3 feet thick.
But no reconciliation was ever effected between the Walpi and the
Sikyátki and their allies, and in spite of their defensive wall frequent
assaults were made upon the latter until they were forced to retreat.
The greater number of them retired to Oraibi and the remainder to
Sikyátki, and the feud was still maintained between them and the Walpi.
[Illustration: Plate VII. Horn House ruin, plan.]
Some of the incidents as well as the disastrous termination of this feud
are still narrated. A party of the Sikyátki went prowling through Walpi
one day while the men were afield, and among other outrages, one of them
shot an arrow through a window and killed a chief’s daughter while she
was grinding corn. The chief’s son resolved to avenge the death of his
sister, and some time after this went to Sikyátki, professedly to take
part in a religious dance, in which he joined until just before the
close of the ceremony. Having previously observed where the handsomest
girl was seated among the spectators on the house terraces, he ran up
the ladder as if to offer her a prayer emblem, but instead he drew out a
sharp flint knife from his girdle and cut her throat. He threw the body
down where all could see it, and ran along the adjoining terraces till
he cleared the village. A little way up the mesa was a large flat rock,
upon which he sprang and took off his dancer’s mask so that all might
recognize him; then turning again to the mesa he sped swiftly up the
trail and escaped.
And so foray and slaughter continued to alternate between them until the
planting season of some indefinite year came around. All the Sikyátki
men were to begin the season by planting the fields of their chief on a
certain day, which was announced from the housetop by the Second Chief
as he made his customary evening proclamations, and the Walpi, becoming
aware of this, planned a fatal onslaught. Every man and woman able to
draw a bow or wield a weapon were got in readiness and at night they
crossed the mesa and concealed themselves along its edge, overlooking
the doomed village. When the day came they waited until the men had gone
to the field and then rushed down upon the houses. The chief, who was
too old to go afield, was the first one killed, and then followed the
indiscriminate slaughter of women and children, and the destruction of
the houses. The wild tumult in the village alarmed the Sikyátki and they
came rushing back, but too late to defend their homes. Their struggles
were hopeless, for they had only their planting sticks to use as
weapons, which availed but little against the Walpi with their bows and
arrows, spears, slings, and war clubs. Nearly all of the Sikyátki men
were killed, but some of them escaped to Oraibi and some to Awatubi. A
number of the girls and younger women were spared, and distributed among
the different villages, where they became wives of their despoilers.
It is said to have been shortly after the destruction of Sikyátki that
the first serious inroad of a hostile tribe occurred within this region,
and all the stories aver that these early hostiles were from the north,
the Ute being the first who are mentioned, and after them the Apache,
who made an occasional foray.
While these families of Hopituh stock had been building their straggling
dwellings along the canyon brinks, and grouping in villages around the
base of the East Mesa, other migratory bands of Hopituh had begun to
arrive on the Middle Mesa. As already said, it is admitted that the
Snake were the first occupants of this region, but beyond that fact the
traditions are contradictory and confused. It is probable, however, that
not long after the arrival of the Horn, the Squash people came from the
south and built a village on the Middle Mesa, the ruin of which is
called Chukubi. It is on the edge of the cliff on the east side of the
neck of that mesa, and a short distance south of the direct trail
leading from Walpi to Oraibi. The Squash people say that they came from
Palát Kwabi, the Red Land in the far South, and this vague term
expresses nearly all their knowledge of that traditional land. They say
they lived for a long time in the valley of the Colorado Chiquito,
on the south side of that stream and not far from the point where the
railway crosses it. They still distinguish the ruin of their early
village there, which was built as usual on the brink of a canyon, and
call it Etípsíkya, after a shrub that grows there profusely. They
crossed the river opposite that place, but built no permanent houses
until they reached the vicinity of Chukubi, near which two smaller
clusters of ruins, on knolls, mark the sites of dwellings which they
claim to have been theirs. Three groups (nyumu) traveling together were
the next to follow them; these were the Bear, the Bear-skin-rope, and
the Blue Jay. They are said to have been very numerous, and to have come
from the vicinity of San Francisco Mountain. They did not move up to
Chukubi, but built a large village on the summit, at the south end of
the mesa, close to the site of the present Mashongnavi. Soon afterward
came the Burrowing Owl, and the Coyote, from the vicinity of Navajo
Mountains in the north, but they were not very numerous. They also built
upon the Mashongnavi summit.
After this the Squash people found that the water from their springs was
decreasing, and began moving toward the end of the mesa, where the other
people were. But as there was then no suitable place left on the summit,
they built a village on the sandy terrace close below it, on the west
side; and as the springs at Chukubi ultimately ceased entirely, the rest
of the Squash people came to the terrace and were again united in one
village. Straggling bands of several other groups, both wingwu and
nyumu, are mentioned as coming from various directions. Some built on
the terrace and some found house room in Mashongnavi. This name is
derived as follows: On the south side of the terrace on which the Squash
village was built is a high column of sandstone which is vertically
split in two, and formerly there was a third pillar in line, which has
long since fallen. These three columns were called Tútuwalha, the
guardians, and both the Squash village and the one on the summit were so
named. On the north side of the terrace, close to the present village,
is another irregular massy pillar of sandstone called Mashóniniptu,
meaning “the other which remains erect,” having reference to the one on
the south side, which had fallen. When the Squash withdrew to the summit
the village was then called Mashóniniptuovi, “at the place of the other
which remains erect;” now that term is never used, but always its
syncopated form, Mashongnavi.
[Illustration: Plate VIII. Bat House.]
The Squash village, on the south end of the Middle Mesa, was attacked by
a fierce band that came from the north, some say the Ute, others say the
Apache; but whoever the invaders were, they completely overpowered the
people, and carried off great stores of food and other plunder. The
village was then evacuated, the houses dismantled, and the material
removed to the high summit, where they reconstructed their dwellings
around the village which thenceforth bore its present name of
Mashongnavi. Some of the Squash people moved over to Oraibi, and
portions of the Katchina and Paroquet people came from there to
Mashongnavi about the same time, and a few of these two groups occupied
some vacant houses also in Shupaulovi; for this village even at that
early date had greatly diminished in population, having sustained a
disastrous loss of men in the canyon affrays east of Walpi.
Shumopavi seems to have been built by portions of the same groups who
went to the adjacent Mashongnavi, but the traditions of the two villages
are conflicting. The old traditionists at Shumopavi hold that the first
to come there were the Paroquet, the Bear, the Bear-skin-rope, and the
Blue Jay. They came from the west–probably from San Francisco Mountain.
They claim that ruins on a mesa bluff about 10 miles south from the
present village are the remains of a village built by these groups
before reaching Shumopavi, and the Paroquets arrived first, it is said,
because they were perched on the heads of the Bears, and, when nearing
the water, they flew in ahead of the others. These groups built a
village on a broken terrace, on the east side of the cliff, and just
below the present village. There is a spring close by called after the
Shunóhu, a tall red grass, which grew abundantly there, and from which
the town took its name. This spring was formerly very large, but two
years ago a landslide completely buried it; lately, however, a small
outflow is again apparent.
The ruins of the early village cover a hillocky area of about 800 by 250
feet, but it is impossible to trace much of the ground plan with
accuracy. The corner of an old house still stands, some 6 or 8 feet
high, extending about 15 feet on one face and about 10 feet on the
other. The wall is over 3 feet in thickness, but of very clumsy masonry,
no care having been exercised in dressing the stones, which are of
varying sizes and laid in mud plaster. Interest attaches to this
fragment, as it is one of the few tangible evidences left of the Spanish
priests who engaged in the fatal mission to the Hopituh in the sixteenth
century. This bit of wall, which now forms part of a sheep-fold, is
pointed out as the remains of one of the mission buildings.
Other groups followed–the Mole, the Spider, and the “Wíksrun.” These
latter took their name from a curious ornament worn by the men. A piece
of the leg-bone of a bear, from which the marrow had been extracted and
a stopper fixed in one end, was attached to the fillet binding the hair,
and hung down in front of the forehead. This gens and the Mole are now
extinct.
Shumopavi received no further accession of population, but lost to
some extent by a portion of the Bear people moving across to Walpi.
No important event seems to have occurred among them for a long period
after the destruction of Sikyátki, in which they bore some part, and
only cursory mention is made of the ingress of “enemies from the north;”
but their village, apparently, was not assailed.
The Oraibi traditions tend to confirm those of Shumopavi, and tell that
the first houses there were built by Bears, who came from the latter
place. The following is from a curious legend of the early settlement:
The Bear people had two chiefs, who were brothers; the elder was called
Vwen-ti-só-mo, and the younger Ma-tcí-to. They had a desperate quarrel
at Shumopavi, and their people divided into two factions, according as
they inclined to one or other of the contestants. After a long period of
contention Ma-tcí-to and his followers withdrew to the mesa where Oraibi
now stands, about 8 miles northwest from Shumopavi, and built houses a
little to the southwest of the limits of the present town. These houses
were afterwards destroyed by “enemies from the north,” and the older
portion of the existing town, the southwest ends of the house rows, were
built with stones from the demolished houses. Fragments of these early
walls are still occasionally unearthed.
After Ma-tcí-to and his people were established there, whenever any of
the Shumopavi people became dissatisfied with that place they built at
Oraibi, Ma-tcí-to placed a little stone monument about halfway between
these two villages to mark the boundary of the land. Vwenti-so´-mo
objected to this, but it was ultimately accepted with the proviso that
the village growing the fastest should have the privilege of moving it
toward the other village. The monument still stands, and is on the
direct Oraibi trail from Shumopavi, 3 miles from the latter. It is a
well dressed, rectangular block of sandstone, projecting two feet above
the ground, and measures 8½ by 7 inches. On the end is carved the rude
semblance of a human head, or mask, the eyes and mouth being merely
round shallow holes, with a black line painted around them. The stone is
pecked on the side, but the head and front are rubbed quite smooth, and
the block, tapering slightly to the base, suggests the ancient Roman
Termini.
There are Eagle people living at Oraibi, Mashongnavi, and Walpi, and it
would seem as if they had journeyed for some time with the later Snake
people and others from the northwest. Vague traditions attach them to
several of the ruins north of the Moen-kopi, although most of these are
regarded as the remains of Snake dwellings.
The legend of the Eagle people introduces them from the west, coming in
by way of the Moen-kopi water course. They found many people living in
Tusayan, at Oraibi, the Middle Mesa, and near the East Mesa, but the
Snake village was yet in the valley. Some of the Eagles remained at
Oraibi, but the main body moved to a large mound just east of
Mashongnavi, on the summit of which they built a village and called it
Shi-tái-mu. Numerous traces of small-roomed houses can be seen on this
mound and on some of the lower surroundings. The uneven summit is about
300 by 200 feet, and the village seems to have been built in the form of
an irregular ellipse, but the ground plan is very obscure.
[Illustration: Plate IX. Mishiptonga (Jeditoh).]
While the Eagles were living at Shi-tái-mu, they sent “Yellow Foot” to
the mountain in the east (at the headwaters of the Rio Grande) to obtain
a dog. After many perilous adventures in caverns guarded by bear,
mountain lion, and rattlesnake, he got two dogs and returned. They were
wanted to keep the coyotes out of the corn and the gardens. The dogs
grew numerous, and would go to Mashongnavi in search of food, and also
to some of the people of that village, which led to serious quarrels
between them and the Eagle people. Ultimately the Shi-tái-mu chief
proclaimed a feast, and told the people to prepare to leave the village
forever. On the feast day the women arranged the food basins on the
ground in a long line leading out of the village. The people passed
along this line, tasting a mouthful here or there, but without stopping,
and when they reached the last basin they were beyond the limits of the
village. Without turning around they continued on down into the valley
until they were halted by the Snake people. An arrangement was effected
with the latter, and the Eagles built their houses in the Snake village.
A few of the Eagle families who had become attached to Mashongnavi chose
to go to that village, where their descendants still reside, and are yet
held as close relatives by the Eagles of Walpi. The land around the East
Mesa was then portioned out, the Snakes, Horns, Bears, and Eagles each
receiving separate lands, and these old allotments are still
approximately maintained.
According to the Eagle traditions the early occupants of Tusayan came in
the following succession: Snake, Horn, Bear, Middle Mesa, Oraibi, and
Eagle, and finally from the south came the Water families. This sequence
is also recognized in the general tenor of the legends of the other
groups.
Shupaulovi, a small village quite close to Mashongnavi, would seem to
have been established just before the coming of the Water people. Nor
does there seem to have been any very long interval between the arrival
of the earliest occupants of the Middle Mesa and this latest colony.
These were the Sun people, and like the Squash folk, claim to have come
from Palátkwabi, the Red Land, in the south. On their northward
migration, when they came to the valley of the Colorado Chiquito, they
found the Water people there, with whom they lived for some time. This
combined village was built upon Homólobi, a round terraced mound near
Sunset Crossing, where fragmentary ruins covering a wide area can yet be
traced.
Incoming people from the east had built the large village of Awatubi,
high rock, upon a steep mesa about nine miles southeast from Walpi. When
the Sun people came into Tusayan they halted at that village and a few
of them remained there permanently, but the others continued west to the
Middle Mesa. At that time also they say Chukubi, Shitaimu, Mashongnavi,
and the Squash village on the terrace were all occupied, and they built
on the terrace close to the Squash village also. The Sun people were
then very numerous and soon spread their dwellings over the summit where
the ruin now stands, and many indistinct lines of house walls around
this dilapidated village attest its former size. Like the neighboring
village, it takes its name from a rock near by, which is used as a place
for the deposit of votive offerings, but the etymology of the term can
not be traced.
Some of the Bear people also took up their abode at Shupaulovi, and
later a nyumu of the Water family called Batni, moisture, built with
them; and the diminished families of the existing village are still
composed entirely of these three nyumu.
The next arrivals seem to have been the Asanyumu, who in early days
lived in the region of the Chama, in New Mexico, at a village called
Kaékibi, near the place now known as Abiquiu. When they left that region
they moved slowly westward to a place called Túwii (Santo Domingo),
where some of them are said to still reside. The next halt was at
Kaiwáika (Laguna) where it is said some families still remain, and they
staid also a short time at A´ikoka (Acoma); but none of them remained at
that place. From the latter place they went to Sióki (Zuñi), where they
remained a long time and left a number of their people there, who are
now called Aiyáhokwi by the Zuñi. They finally reached Tusayan by way of
Awatubi. They had been preceded from the same part of New Mexico by the
Honan nyumu (the Badger people), whom they found living at the
last-named village. The Magpie, the Pute Kóhu (Boomerang-shaped hunting
stick), and the Field-mouse families of the Asa remained and built
beside the Badger, but the rest of its groups continued across to the
Walpi Mesa. They were not at first permitted to come up to Walpi, which
then occupied its present site, but were allotted a place to build at
Coyote Water, a small spring on the east side of the mesa, just under
the gap. They had not lived there very long, however, when for some
valuable services in defeating at one time a raid of the Ute (who used
to be called the Tcingawúptuh) and of the Navajo at another, they were
given for planting grounds all the space on the mesa summit from the gap
to where Sichumovi now stands, and the same width, extending across the
valley to the east. On the mesa summit they built the early portion of
the house mass on the north side of the village, now known as Hano. But
soon after this came a succession of dry seasons, which caused a great
scarcity of food almost amounting to a famine, and many moved away to
distant streams. The Asa people went to Túpkabi (Deep Canyon, the de
Chelly), about 70 miles northeast from Walpi, where the Navajo received
them kindly and supplied them with food. The Asa had preserved some
seeds of the peach, which they planted in the canyon nooks, and numerous
little orchards still flourish there. They also brought the Navajo new
varieties of food plants, and their relations grew very cordial. They
built houses along the base of the canyon walls, and dwelt there for two
or three generations, during which time many of the Asa women were given
to the Navajo, and the descendants of these now constitute a numerous
clan among the Navajo, known as the Kiáini, the High-house people.
[Illustration: Plate X. A small ruin near Moen-kopi.]
The Navajo and the Asa eventually quarreled and the latter returned to
Walpi, but this was after the arrival of the Hano, by whom they found
their old houses occupied. The Asa were taken into the village of Walpi,
being given a vacant strip on the east edge of the mesa, just where the
main trail comes up to the village. The Navajo, Ute, and Apache had
frequently gained entrance to the village by this trail, and to guard it
the Asa built a house group along the edge of the cliff at that point,
immediately overlooking the trail, where some of the people still live;
and the kiva there, now used by the Snake order, belongs to them. There
was a crevice in the rock, with a smooth bottom extending to the edge of
the cliff and deep enough for a ki´koli. A wall was built to close the
outer edge and it was at first intended to build a dwelling house there,
but it was afterward excavated to its present size and made into a kiva,
still called the wikwálhobi, the kiva of the Watchers of the High Place.
The Walpi site becoming crowded, some of the Bear and Lizard people
moved out and built houses on the site of the present Sichumovi; several
Asa families followed them, and after them came some of the Badger
people. The village grew to an extent considerably beyond its present
size, when it was abandoned on account of a malignant plague. After the
plague, and within the present generation, the village was rebuilt–the
old houses being torn down to make the new ones.
After the Asa came the nest group to arrive was the Water family. Their
chief begins the story of their migration in this way:
In the long ago the Snake, Horn, and Eagle people lived here (in
Tusayan), but their corn grew only a span high, and when they sang
for rain the cloud god sent only a thin mist. My people then lived
in the distant Pa-lát Kwá-bi in the South. There was a very bad old
man there, who, when he met any one, would spit in his face, blow
his nose upon him, and rub ordure upon him. He ravished the girls
and did all manner of evil. Baholikonga got angry at this and turned
the world upside down, and water spouted up through the kivas and
through the fireplaces in the houses. The earth was rent in great
chasms, and water covered everything except one narrow ridge of mud;
and across this the serpent deity told all the people to travel.
As they journeyed across, the feet of the bad slipped and they fell
into the dark water, but the good, after many days, reached dry
land. While the water was rising around the village the old people
got on the tops of the houses, for they thought they could not
struggle across with the younger people; but Baholikonga clothed
them with the skins of turkeys, and they spread their wings out and
floated in the air just above the surface of the water, and in this
way they got across. There were saved of our people Water, Corn,
Lizard, Horned Toad, Sand, two families of Rabbit, and Tobacco. The
turkey tail dragged in the water–hence the white on the turkey tail
now. Wearing these turkey-skins is the reason why old people have
dewlaps under the chin like a turkey; it is also the reason why old
people use turkey-feathers at the religious ceremonies.
In the story of the wandering of the Water people, many vague references
are made to various villages in the South, which they constructed or
dwelt in, and to rocks where they carved their totems at temporary
halting places. They dwelt for a long time at Homólobi, where the Sun
people joined them; and probably not long after the latter left the
Water people followed on after them. The largest number of this family
seem to have made their dwellings first at Mashongnavi and Shupaulovi;
but like the Sun people they soon spread to all the villages.
The narrative of part of this journey is thus given by the chief before
quoted:
It occupied 4 years to cross the disrupted country. The kwakwanti (a
warrior order) went ahead of the people and carried seed of corn,
beans, melons, squashes, and cotton. They would plant corn in the
mud at early morning and by noon it was ripe and thus the people
were fed. When they reached solid ground they rested, and then they
built houses. The kwakwanti were always out exploring–sometimes
they were gone as long as four years. Again we would follow them on
long journeys, and halt and build houses and plant. While we were
traveling if a woman became heavy with child we would build her a
house and put plenty of food in it and leave her there, and from
these women sprang the Pima, Maricopa, and other Indians in the
South.
Away in the South, before we crossed the mountains (south of the
Apache country) we built large houses and lived there a long while.
Near these houses is a large rock on which was painted the
rain-clouds of the Water phratry, also a man carrying corn in his
arms; and the other phratries also painted the Lizard and the Rabbit
upon it. While they were living there the kwakwanti made an
expedition far to the north and came in conflict with a hostile
people. They fought day after day, for days and days–they fought by
day only and when night came they separated, each party retiring to
its own ground to rest. One night the cranes came and each crane
took a kwakwanti on his back and brought them back to their people
in the South.
Again all the people traveled north until they came to the Little
Colorado, near San Francisco Mountains, and there they built houses
up and down the river. They also made long ditches to carry the
water from the river to their gardens. After living there a long
while they began to be plagued with swarms of a kind of gnat called
the sand-fly, which bit the children, causing them to swell up and
die. The place becoming unendurable, they were forced again to
resume their travels. Before starting, one of the Rain-women, who
was big with child, was made comfortable in one of the houses on the
mountain. She told her people to leave her, because she knew this
was the place where she was to remain forever. She also told them,
that hereafter whenever they should return to the mountain to hunt
she would provide them with plenty of game. Under her house is a
spring and any sterile woman who drinks of its water will bear
children. The people then began a long journey to reach the summit
of the table land on the north. They camped for rest on one of the
terraces, where there was no water, and they were very tired and
thirsty. Here the women celebrated the rain-feast–they danced for
three days, and on the fourth day the clouds brought heavy rain and
refreshed the people. This event is still commemorated by a circle
of stones at that place. They reached a spring southeast from
Káibitho (Kumás Spring) and there they built a house and lived for
some time. Our people had plenty of rain and cultivated much corn
and some of the Walpi people came to visit us. They told ns that
their rain only came here and there in fine misty sprays, and a
basketful of corn was regarded as a large crop. So they asked us to
come to their land and live with them and finally we consented. When
we got there we found some Eagle people living near the Second Mesa;
our people divided, and part went with the Eagle and have ever since
remained there; but we camped near the First Mesa. It was planting
time and the Walpi celebrated their rain-feast but they brought only
a mere misty drizzle. Then we celebrated our rain-feast and planted.
Great rains and thunder and lightning immediately followed and on
the first day after planting our corn was half an arm’s length high;
on the fourth day it was its full height, and in one moon it was
ripe. When we were going up to the village (Walpi was then north of
the gap, probably), we were met by a Bear man who said that our
thunder frightened the women and we must not go near the village.
Then the kwakwanti said, “Let us leave these people and seek a land
somewhere else,” but our women said they were tired of travel and
insisted upon our remaining. Then “Fire-picker” came down from the
village and told us to come up there and stay, but after we had got
into the village the Walpi women screamed out against us–they
feared our thunder–and so the Walpi turned us away. Then our
people, except those who went to the Second Mesa, traveled to the
northeast as far as the Tsegi (Canyon de Chelly), but I can not tell
whether our people built the louses there. Then they came hack to
this region again and built houses and had much trouble with the
Walpi, but we have lived here ever since.